hurt president obama? a lot of people felt he was trying to not mess up. was he too passive? was it too safe? >> you know, it's hard to say if he really messed up. he had the opportunity with a decisive victory to pretty much be able to put this election behind himself. we had seen all the polls. he actually holds a narrow lead. but even greater leads in some of the presidential battleground states like in ohio. so a decisive victory for him, we would start looking ahead to the general election and say he has the clear advantage. so on that front, i don't think that he succeeded, but he has two more debates to go. as we were just talking about, i'm not sure, and the history proves this, that these debates -- all that matter about voter preferences. >> mark murray, we appreciate you coming in. we'll see more analysis on the "today" show coming up in a few minutes. >>> for some voters, last night's debate may forever be known as the big bird debate. that's because of a comment mitt romney made while detailin